


A Brother's Comfort

by wargoddess



Series: A Family Affair [14]
Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Angst, Animalistic, Demons, Drunk Sex, Fight Pollen, Incest, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Scent Marking, Sex Pollen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 06:26:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19762444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wargoddess/pseuds/wargoddess
Summary: Demons don't share easily. Vergil especially isn't interested in sharing Dante.





	A Brother's Comfort

**Author's Note:**

> A combo of two prompts! D/V doing it "humanstyle," plus a bit of sex pollen on Vergil's part.

Vergil is at work when the sudden urge to murder his son comes upon him.

He enjoys running a business. There's something about the contradictory, predatory mess of capitalism that feels surprisingly similar to the chaos of the underworld, and it gives him equal pleasure to master both. In human business, for example, one is expected to succeed fairly, on skill and foresight -- despite the cutthroat illegality and immorality that runs rampant among competitors and even government organizations tasked with oversight. Because of this, although Vergil leaves most of the day-to-day detail of the business to his assistant managers, he spends several hours each week going over the books and making certain that the managers are pursuing his favored strategies. 

Three of them are. The fourth has embezzled several hundred thousand dollars over the past year. Vergil doesn't really mind the theft; he's got more than enough money to live as he pleases, and in any case, he's a demon. What infuriates him is that the manager isn't doing it to set up a competing business or to prepare for a hostile takeover of Vergil's controlling interest. The fool has instead spent the money on a sports car and a teenaged lover, after leaving a paper trail a mile wide. Vergil can abide many things that humans consider unbearably immoral, but incompetence and poor taste are killing offenses as far as he is concerned.

Thus he is in the middle of contemplating how to kill the assistant manager in a way that won't prompt a lecture from Dante or Nero, when he finds himself contemplating killing Nero instead. He would do it fairly, of course: in battle, with both of them well-rested and able to fight to their fullest. Nero's new form is surprisingly quick for its size, and his endlessly creative Devil Bringer attacks have effectively become one-hit kills now that he's got the mass and power to really drive them home. Because of this, Vergil will have to take off the boy's limbs first: a cruelty, perhaps, especially given their history, but necessary because of Nero's longer reach. Then he will be able to carve out Nero's heart, or take his head. 

And when the deed is done, Vergil will make his son into a Devil Arm of exquisite power. Not gauntlets, though that might be fitting; Vergil has no need of gauntlets. He wants a wakizashi to pair with Yamato, so that he can keep his magnificent boy ever at his side --

Vergil pauses in the middle of staring at a ledger page, and then he closes the book. The urge does not fade. No scent of enemy nearby. No prickle of foreign magic. The bloodlust is coming from inside the house.

So Vergil summons Yamato, sets the blade in its scabbard on the floor, and props his hands atop it, to meditate.

In a dark elsewhere, there is a soft hiss of scales which Vergil found frightening as a child. It was a sound that he heard in his dreams -- though he was better-off than Dante, who heard only an endless bloodcurdling roar, in his. Then their father vanished and the minions of Mundus came, and in Vergil's terror, he deliberately reached into that dark place for the first time. Thus he discovered that the demon residing there was himself. He has felt no true fear since that long-ago day when it came to him and made them one.

He waits while his demon uncoils itself from where it has been wrapped around his mind. _You do not mean to kill the young one_ , it says.

"I do not," Vergil replies, mildly offended that it would even ask. They are not often at odds, he and the dragon. "It pleases me to have a strong rival. It should please you as well."

_He threatens our rule, and must therefore die._ It sounds mildly offended that he would protest its decree.

"He has issued no challenge. Nero has no desire to rule."

_He is a demon lord. His existence is a challenge. The desire to rule runs in his blood, etched upon his bones._

"And I've seen him fighting it. He would rather have us as family than as enemies. This is a weakness of his human component -- and he is mostly human, remember. It may be used to our advantage."

He feels the demon consider this, its coils shifting slowly as it does so. _He **does** seem unusually willing to abase himself to us,_ it says, thoughtfully. Then it growls, a sound that echoes throughout his innermost space. _Yet this upstart child lays claim to what has been ours since we formed in the womb. That alone is an insult which cannot be borne._

Vergil sighs, both in his inner space and in his modest office within a nondescript commercial building. He taps a fingertip against Yamato's hilt while he mulls over the conundrum. Demons are obstinate creatures, and Vergil's in particular is a stickler for the rules -- but rules, Vergil has long understood, are simply another form of battle. 

"If I reclaim Dante," he says, "then by default, I will have taken a most precious treasure from this young demon lord. Such a humiliating loss will reduce him in status to a mere subordinate." Vergil shrugs. "Then I may permit him to live on my sufferance -- provided that he offers tribute upon demand, thereafter."

The demon rumbles with pleasure. _And we do **so** enjoy making demands of young Nero. Very good._ Vergil inclines his head in gracious acknowledgement of his own cleverness. _Your proposal for battle by proxy is accepted._

And with that, the demon withdraws into quiescence again. Not sleeping, because Vergil's demon never sleeps. Simply part of him, so closely intertwined that there's hardly any need for overt communication. 

Vergil's demon is an impatient creature, however, so Vergil gets to his feet, gathering up the ledgers and his laptop and all the other trappings of his business. Time to put away foolish things, and focus again on the only thing that matters: power.

The urge to hunt down Nero has only grown stronger during the brief moments of Vergil's negotiation with his demon self. A new urge has joined this, now, which is equally powerful: the hunger to steal Dante. Take him, mark him, cover him with Vergil's sweat and seed, and make him cry Vergil's name while Vergil does all of it. Then the next time Nero presumes to taste what is Vergil's, he will know himself bested, and his ambitions -- such as they are -- compromised. Then Vergil will take him too, and remind the boy of who truly rules in this world and the next.

With a cold smile of anticipatory pleasure, Vergil takes the elevator up to the office building's rooftop. There, he unfurls his true self, spreads all four of his wings, and blasts into the noonday sky in a blaze of blue.

Devil May Cry is unusually quiet when Vergil gets there. Nero's scent is thick about the place, but the boy himself is not present -- for which Vergil is privately glad, given that just the scent alone fills his mind with a red haze of incipient violence. He would be able to control himself if Nero were present. It's just easier that he's not. 

Someone is in the building, though, oh, yes. Nero has been negligent and left no warding-spells, no servant-demons on guard. Vergil smiles again as he anticipates snatching Dante right out from under the boy's nose.

He tracks the steady thump of Dante's heartbeat upstairs. No sound of motion from here, and the heartbeat is slower than usual; the prize sleeps. As he stalks through the shadows of the old building, he considers what he will do. Take Dante downstairs and put him over his desk so that they become the first thing Nero sees when he walks in? Have him on the couch, slow twining sex with Dante tied artfully in magicked ropes, with Vergil's cock in Dante's mouth when Nero sees them? 

No. No telling how long the boy will be gone, and Vergil's hunger has grown to epic proportions; he _needs_ to fuck Dante, now. He can't think past this need. His hands ache for the smooth-rough texture of Dante's skin and the scrape of his stubble. His mouth waters for the salt of Dante's flesh. Most likely he will fall upon Dante in a frenzy the moment he finds him -- and then drag him toward downstairs and take him again on the steps, and finally make it to the entry hall, there to have him again there on the floor. Yes. All of that will do.

Then he reaches the place where Dante is sleeping, and stops in instant, intense annoyance. 

Because Dante is asleep in the clawfoot tub, with a cowboy hat tucked down over his face and his arms and legs draped over the sides. He's snoring. And in one of his hands, half uncapped and dripping the priceless stuff into a puddle, is the flask of Qliphoth liqueur that Vergil gave him upon their return from the demon world. 

Dante, the prize for which Vergil must compete or be forced by instinct to kill his son, is _drunk_ in a _tub_. Vergil's need to fuck him is suddenly and savagely eclipsed by the desire to murder him, instead of Nero.

He walks over, grabs Dante by the throat, and hauls him out of the tub with a sloshing splash of cold water and an unceremonious snarl. It's a measure of just how drunk Dante is that he doesn't wake with this, although his hat tumbles off and the Qliphoth liqueur bottle falls out of his hand. (Vergil doesn't bother to cap it. Dante should take better care of Vergil's gifts.) He's still got his jeans on, which irritatingly slows things down when Vergil gets him into the bedroom -- _Nero's_ bedroom, just because -- and tries to peel him out of the wet denim. He eventually has to rip the stuff off, destroying the garment. However, Dante finally wakes as Vergil yanks at the offending cloth.

"Oh, hey," Dante says, brightening at once when he sees Vergil. An enormous, deliriously happy smile spreads across his face. "It's you. Vergil. Big brother. I missed you so much." 

Exactly one day has passed since they last saw each other. Vergil grunts noncommittally, throwing the wet jeans across the room so hard that they slap a print into the wall. He undresses himself quickly and with less care for his clothing than is normal for him, but the only reason he's even bothering is because Dante tends to claw when he's enjoying himself, and the cost of cleaning blood out of silk embroidery is prohibitive. The thread never does get back its full sheen.

Dante sits up on his elbows, grinning at the sight of Vergil's erection as it is bared. "God, you're gorgeous," he says. It's only a little slurred, but then Dante generally holds liquor well, unless it's Qliphoth liqueur. "How did you end up so pretty? I don't look that nice. Is it 'cause you cut yourself in half? Is that your skincare regimen?" He snickers.

Vergil sets his jaw. Dante is full of nonsense at the best of times, but drunkeness brings out the worst of it. And really, Vergil prefers not to take him at times like this, because there's no fight to him. Dante is a happy, horny drunk. Then again, Vergil is too on edge, his breath a harsh pant and his thoughts limned in blue-hot fire. Not the best time for a fight.

Dante smells of bathwater and liquor, not desire, which is intolerable. Vergil throws his legs apart and licks a line up the underside of his half-awake cock. Dante hisses as if this hurts and thrusts up eagerly, but Vergil holds his hips down and swallows him up and within seconds Dante is no longer merely half awake or babbling about skincare. Suddenly he reeks of lust, and it drives Vergil half mad at once. When Vergil moves onto him to claim more of his damp flesh, Dante wraps his legs around Vergil's waist and his arms around Vergil's shoulders, enfolding him and stroking his hair with a long sigh. 

"Love you," he says. "So goddamn much, Verg. Always loved you."

"Turn over," Vergil snaps, shoving Dante's arms away and moving off him. God, he's ridiculous.

Dante obligingly rolls onto his belly -- then rolls again before Vergil can stop him, and furthermore gets up on his knees, raising his ass shamelessly. He does this with his head facing Vergil, though, which ruins the view. Especially since Dante has propped his chin on his folded arms and begun to cry. What.

"Verg," he says, his expression tragic. "Oh, Verg. I've been such a terrible brother to you."

Vergil stares at him, actually distracted enough by this that he does not yank Dante around so he can start fucking that beautifully-presented ass. "You're drunk, Dante." 

"No -- I mean, yeah, shitfaced, totally -- but no, I mean it, I'm terrible. And, like... and I saw you w-wi' Nero -- "

Vergil growls, and knows by the way his vision goes brighter for an instant that his eyes have begun to glow. "I do _not_ want to hear about Nero right now, Dante."

" -- and I know you love him more than me." When Vergil starts at this, Dante looks up at him, his mouth pulled into a nearly perfect downturned half-circle. "An' I don't know how to tell you that I, like, I _want_ that, even if I don't deserve it. I want what you have with him, even... if I let you down back then. But I just... It always _hurts_ with you. An' I like that, not even gonna lie, always so good even when I'm screaming, but just once I wanna... not hurt. Just... to know, you know? What it's l-like when you don't... fucking hate me..."

Then he actually starts _sobbing_.

And Vergil stares down at him, completely flummoxed.

But then he processes the flood of slurred words, and understands.

There has always been pain between them. Since That Day. Since they were younger than Nero, but after Vergil had already grown old with the weight of hunts and assassination attempts and years of ceaseless, awful solitude. Then he found Dante again: impossibly alive, infuriatingly happy and beautiful and without a care in the world. Concerned only with his own pleasure, and living among the humans as if he was one of them. Vergil won that first battle, of course. He had graciously allowed Dante to keep their mother's amulet when he begged... and then Vergil had taken his body in recompense, snarling into his ear while Dante struggled and then laughed and then moaned like a beast while they satisfied each other as no human had ever been able to do. For a month afterward, Vergil had returned every night, using Dante again and again -- and telling himself that there was nothing wrong with being addicted to the taste of another person's flesh. He _owned_ that flesh, did he not? And that flesh owed him: a pound of pain for every ounce of happiness Dante had enjoyed while Vergil slept in cars and shivered through the winter cold. A scream for every iota of their mother's favoritism. 

But they were demon. And so Dante had only taken that pain, and reveled in it, and offered Vergil a joint to smoke when they were done.

Then Vergil had gone to prepare for the raising of the Temen-ni-gru. He hadn't bothered to say farewell, or even to speak to Dante for a year -- so of course Dante had come, when Arkham relayed the invitation. Of course he had lost the next fight, same as the first, his eyes full of betrayal when Vergil rammed the Rebellion through his sternum and then walked away. _Now you know what it feels like,_ Vergil had thought, clenching his jaw against the next thought and completely failing to keep it at bay. It was this thought that had made him want to fall, at the end, as foolish a decision as that was. He had suffered through years after, alone again, in agony... but nothing Mundus inflicted on him had hurt as much as that one, terrible, unending wish.

_Now I can stop needing you. Please, God, Father, just let me stop needing --_

Vergil stares down at Dante while his younger brother weeps drunkenly.

Then he bends and pushes Dante over onto his back, and lies down beside him. "Hush, now," he says softly, cupping Dante's face. Dante blinks at him owlishly, and Vergil sighs. "There's no need for all this foolishness. All you ever had to do was ask, brother."

And then... Vergil makes love to him. He doesn't think of it in those specific terms; he is demon, after all, and sex is sex. Still, the rules of the underworld are not violated if he touches Dante gently, and kisses him slowly, carefully, as if mapping his mouth to remember the next time that he is trapped in darkness. No law of dominance is served when he spoons behind Dante so that he might hold his brother during their coupling, or when he grazes teeth along the tendon of Dante's throat rather than biting to leave a mark. The law is not violated, either, however. And it is enough for Vergil's demon that Dante is left breathless, trembling, moaning out Vergil's name over and over as Vergil asks him what he wants ("You, you, fucking you"), then gives it to him; that Dante begs, "Please don't stop," and Vergil does not; that it goes on all afternoon, and well into the night, and ends only when the moon is midnight-high.

And Vergil's demon is satisfied when, as they lie together in the afterglow, Dante fidgets and then says, this time with no hint of drunkenness slurring his words, "Thanks."

Vergil strokes Dante's sweat-soaked hair back from his face and murmurs, "I've never hated you, Dante. I tried to. Tried so hard that I fell, and lost myself, and had to find my way back again. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't hate you. You were... what I needed. Are. What I need." 

The open shock on Dante's face eases something else in Vergil -- a need that is less demonic, perhaps, and harder to articulate. It hurts Vergil to see it, because the shock means that Dante has truly believed, all this time, that Vergil hates him. But then, sex between them is never quite complete without some kind of pain, is it? In this form, if not the other. 

Some pain is good pain, however. Lancing infected boils, cauterizing wounds that won't otherwise stop bleeding... Vergil has heard that humans sometimes need such things. Poor inferior creatures.

When Dante falls asleep, Vergil gets up, dresses, and heads downstairs. Nero is back, nodding off on the couch in the entry hall, with a book open on his chest. Vergil stands over him and reads the spine. T. S. Eliot. Well, well. Perhaps the boy is developing taste.

Nero stirs belatedly, then brightens when he sees Vergil, before yawning into a stretch. "Hey," he says. "Late job. Bunch of death scissors took over an old hospital. I hate those creepy fucks, and there were like fifty of them, but at least we'll have enough to cover expenses for the next few months."

Vergil sniffs a little in irritation. "You don't have Dante's abysmal business sense. I'm going to pass you the name of my financial advisor." It makes no sense that Devil May Cry runs on such thin margins.

"Oh. Yeah, okay, cool. Anyway, I didn't want to interrupt." Nero jerks his head toward upstairs, smiling a little. "Sounded like things were going just fine without me."

Nero's scent is enticing again, and no longer an incitement to violence -- proof that Vergil's demon has accepted him as a subordinate. Nevertheless, Vergil says, "I've taken Dante in your bed and made him mine again, as he was before and ever shall be."

Nero blinks at him. "Oh. Uh, okay? That's good, I guess? He's been a little down, lately. You usually make him feel better." Vergil raises his eyebrows at this, and Nero amends, "Or you get into a pissing contest with him, and then you have to spar it out, and _that_ makes him feel better. You know."

"Ah. Yes." Vergil then bends to push a hand through Nero's hair. Nero makes an abortive sound of protest, and Vergil goes still, waiting to see if he will issue challenge. 

But Nero only glares at him and pats his hair back into place. "What the hell? God, now I smell like you."

Pleased, Vergil straightens. "I'll expect you to present yourself to me first thing in the morning," he says. "Wear nothing you don't want torn off. If your tribute pleases me, I may permit you to resume occasional, _supervised_ , indulgences with Dante."

Then he turns to head back upstairs. He hears Nero mutter something behind him about fuckshit crazy demon fathers, but his disrespect fits within allowed tolerances, so Vergil ignores it and returns to the bed.

And after he undresses and slides back under the sheet, Dante opens his eyes, and smiles, and wraps warm arms around him to welcome him home.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this took longer than expected. I got quite a few prompts per my last note, and I thought I'd bang these out quickly, but apparently the muse is not feeling as cooperative as I thought. Ehn, we'll see how things go with the rest. Hope you liked!
> 
> If you haven't figured it out yet, the pattern of relationships between the guys keeps shifting. For a while Vergil had both Dante and Nero focused wholly on him. Then Nero started horning after Dante. Then Dante started horning after Nero. Then both of them started horning after Vergil, but not necessarily in their previous D/s configuration. Lately Nero's been switch-hitting with both, but Dante's been enjoying topping Nero, and Vergil still prefers to dominate them both, if only on average, which is what this story was about. What's next? Nero domming the other two? Vergil subbing for Dante? Dogs and cats living together, MASS HYSTERIA!
> 
> T. S. Eliot is a guilty pleasure for me, even though he was a horrible racist, etc., in real life. Can't help it; I like "The Hollow Men." Feels very demon-appropriate.


End file.
